$18/hr job (37k annually) only gives me 1k per paycheck with 28% tax rate. Is this right?

Your withholding seems way too high for your income level. At $18/hour and full-time work, your annual income would be around $37,000, which should put you in the 12% federal tax bracket, not 28%. The issue is likely with your W-4 form. When you started the job, you probably filled out a W-4 that might not accurately reflect your tax situation. Check if you accidentally claimed "0" allowances or selected the "Single" filing status when you should have selected something else. Your employer might be withholding at a higher rate because of how your W-4 was completed. I'd recommend asking your HR department for a new W-4 form to update your withholding. You can also use the IRS Tax Withholding Estimator online to figure out the right settings for your situation. The good news is you'll likely get a significant refund when you file your taxes next year if this continues, but you'd probably prefer to have that money in your paychecks now rather than waiting.

After struggling with similar withholding issues, I found this amazing tool called taxr.ai (https://taxr.ai) that analyzed my paystubs and tax situation. It helped me understand exactly why my withholding was so high and guided me through fixing it. I uploaded my paystub, answered a few questions about my tax situation, and the tool showed me that my employer was withholding at a much higher rate than necessary. It even generated a customized W-4 form that I could submit to HR. After making the change, my next paycheck had almost $200 more in take-home pay! The tool also explained all the different withholding categories on my paystub (federal, state, local, FICA, etc.) and showed me which ones were correctly calculated and which ones needed adjustment. Literally saved me thousands over the year.

Just wanted to follow up - I tried taxr.ai after reading about it here and WOW! I was overpaying by almost $320 per month in taxes because my W-4 was filled out incorrectly. The tool generated a new W-4 that I took to my HR department, and my last paycheck had significantly more take-home pay. What surprised me most was finding out that my employer was withholding state disability at the wrong rate too - something I never would have caught on my own. The step-by-step explanations made it really easy to understand where all my money was going. For anyone in a similar situation as OP, I'd definitely recommend checking it out. Took me less than 10 minutes to get answers that HR couldn't even give me after several emails back and forth.

If you're trying to contact the IRS about your tax withholding situation, good luck getting through! I tried calling them for THREE WEEKS straight about a similar issue last year and could never get past the automated system. Then a coworker told me about Claimyr (https://claimyr.com). It's a service that somehow gets you past the IRS phone tree and puts you in the callback queue automatically. I was skeptical but desperate, so I checked out their demo video (https://youtu.be/_kiP6q8DX5c) and decided to try it. Got a callback from an actual IRS agent within 45 minutes! The agent walked me through exactly how my withholding should be calculated based on my specific situation and helped me understand what adjustments I needed to make on my W-4. Saved me hours of frustration and potentially thousands in overwithholding.

I have to eat my words here. After my skeptical comment, I was still struggling to get through to the IRS about my own withholding issue, so I reluctantly tried Claimyr. To my genuine surprise, I got a callback from an actual IRS agent in about an hour. The agent was able to explain exactly why my withholding was higher than expected (turns out I had checked a box on my W-4 that basically told my employer to withhold extra). They walked me through how to submit a corrected W-4, and my next paycheck had almost $250 more in it! I'm still shocked this worked when I'd spent over 6 hours on multiple days trying to get through myself. For anyone dealing with tax withholding issues like the original poster, being able to actually talk to someone at the IRS made all the difference.

The 28% withholding seems high, but remember that's not just federal income tax. Your total withholding includes: - Federal income tax (probably around 12% in your bracket) - Social Security (6.2%) - Medicare (1.45%) - State income tax (varies by state, but can be 4-6%) - Local/city taxes (if applicable) - Any retirement contributions - Health insurance premiums When you add all that up, 28% total withholding isn't unusual. Your part-time jobs might have withheld less because with lower income, you'd have a lower effective tax rate, and maybe you weren't paying for benefits like health insurance or retirement.

Has anyone noticed that when you go from part-time to full-time, your tax rate often jumps dramatically? When I worked 25 hours a week at $16/hr, my withholding was like 15% total. Then I went full-time at the same job and suddenly it was 27%! I think the payroll systems annualize your income and calculate withholding based on what you'd make for a whole year at that rate. So they see full-time and calculate based on a higher annual income bracket.